


these are my confessions

by seashadows



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Awkward Sexual Situations, Don't copy to another site, First Time, Former Priest Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Hand Jobs, Humor, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Intercrural Sex, M/M, Nicky's theoretical knowledge does NOT translate well to the real world, Sexual Fantasy, brief mention of rimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:39:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27690133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seashadows/pseuds/seashadows
Summary: Nicolò huffed and drew his knees up to his chest. “Well,” he said, “if that wasn’t what you were asking for, you could have just said so. You don’t need to insult everyone who’s used their –““I understand,” Yusuf cut in hastily before Nicolò could repeat himself. Then the last sentence hit him. “Everyone who’s…you mean this is commonplace? How?”“Well,” said Nicolò, loosening his position just slightly, “not commonplace, exactly, but I wasn’t expecting you to be surprised. There are plenty of people who confessed to me that they’d done such a thing.” The same shadow that was apt to appear when he spoke of his past life shuttered down over his eyes, but it soon dissipated. “I was a priest, Yusuf. I’ve heard things.”(Nicolò knows everything about sex - except how to do it. He still manages to surprise Yusuf with the confessions he's heard.)
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 32
Kudos: 414





	these are my confessions

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a fill for [this](https://theoldguardkinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/2726.html?thread=566182#cmt566182) kink meme prompt. OP asked for Nicky knowing much, much more than Joe expected about all kinds of filthy sex acts when Joe finally propositions him, since Nicky heard absolutely everyone's dirtiest and most intimate confessions when he was a priest. 
> 
> Beta-read by certifiedbisexualdisaster. Thank you! :)
> 
> The title comes from the song "Confessions, Part II," by Usher.

In Yusuf’s first thirty-three years on the earth, he had lain with three people. Now that he was sixty, much as he might not have the look of the seasoned old man he sometimes felt he was, he still hadn’t forgotten a single encounter.

When he was nineteen and hiding out by the harbor, locked in an embrace with Abdel, whose father had always feuded bitterly with his own over trading territory, he never could have dreamed that one day he would wish to make those same overtures to a Genoese. Nor would he ever have thought that he would have to phrase them so…delicately.

“Nicolò,” he said, “I have something to ask you.”

Nicolò looked up from his sewing. In the flickering firelight, his eyes looked dark – and so innocent. “Yes, Yusuf?”

 _Careful_ , Yusuf reminded himself. Shocking Nicolò would do no one any good, least of all himself. Nicolò might well decide that shock merited another impalement, and then the chance would be lost forever. Enjoying Yusuf’s kisses these past few days didn’t necessarily mean he wanted anything more, not with how every Christian that Yusuf had ever known seemed to be obsessed with sin. “How much do you know of the ways of men?”

“Ow!” Nicolò stuck his finger into his mouth. Yusuf had to close his eyes to keep from following the motion. “Don’t sneak me questions like that without a warning. The ways of _men?_ ”

“It was only a question,” Yusuf said, bristling. “You don’t need to be offended.”

“I’m not offended,” said Nicolò. “I just thought you were finished posing me heavy questions before you killed me. Last time, it was ‘what is the meaning of life’, and then my head was off my body.”

Yusuf bit the inside of his cheek so he wouldn’t laugh. “I don’t mean to kill you this time,” he said, holding up both hands. “Peace, I mean you no harm.”

“This time,” Nicolò muttered. He brought the needle up to the end of his long nose and squinted. “It’s too dark, anyway. I’ll sew the rip tomorrow.”

“Then come sit by me,” said Yusuf. He patted the patch of sand next to him, and to his delight, Nicolò joined him. “The ways of _men_ ,” he repeated, and took Nicolò’s chin gently in one hand. “Earthly, not heavenly.” He moved close enough that he could feel Nicolò’s breath. “Intimate ways.”

Yusuf could just barely see Nicolò’s pupils begin to dilate, visible even in the poor light, before Nicolò surged forward and kissed him hard. There was too much tongue and Yusuf’s head rang when their teeth struck each other, but he saw stars for more reasons than that, all the same.

He kissed Nicolò a few moments longer before he had to pull back to crane his neck, which was strained with the angle of their heads. “You still like that,” he said, unable to suppress his smile. “Do you know what can come next, Nicolò? That’s what I meant when I asked – the _ways of men._ ”

Nicolò’s eyes widened, and Yusuf knew that he’d struck the mark. “ _Oh_ ,” Nicolò said. Yusuf couldn’t tell if he sounded shocked, eager, or disgusted. It was a mix he’d heard before. “Are you saying that you want us to go down that road?”

Yusuf stole another kiss. It was true, then – anything enjoyable was a sin, with that look on Nicolò’s face. No wonder he had become a priest; those Yusuf had met were more ascetic than any mortal man should have been. Nicolò was the one exception to their generally dour rule, he’d found. “Shall I tell you what I want to do?” he asked. “I’ll say it as slowly as you need.”

Nicolò nodded. “Tell me.”

Yusuf cleared his throat. How could he say that he wanted to press Nicolò’s thighs together and see if they were as soft as they looked? That he wanted to fuck between his legs like Nicolò’s Roman ancestors until they both made the oasis ring with the sounds of their pleasure? “I would like,” he said, “to use a part of you that a man doesn’t usually expect.”

“Wait.” Nicolò held up a hand. “I know what you’re trying to say.” He smiled; the firelight made him look feral with it. “You want to fuck your way inside me with your tongue and make me scream, don’t you?” He tapped his chin with a finger. “Well, I assume you know what you’re doing, so…all right. But we should definitely bathe first.” 

Yusuf’s jaw dropped until he thought it might have been touching the sand. “You…you…what?” People did that? People _wanted_ that? _Nicolò_ wanted that? “You must have misunderstood me,” he finally said. He’d been speaking his own language rather than Sabir, after all, and the tongue still tripped Nicolò up on occasion. “What did you think I said?”

“Oh, that wasn’t it?” Nicolò’s brow furrowed. “’A part of me that a man doesn’t usually expect’ – that isn’t what you meant?”

A knot formed in Yusuf’s belly. How could Nicolò think something like _that_ would be the first thing he’d ask for? Did he think him so depraved? And yet, Yusuf couldn’t bring himself to outright ask. “What exactly,” he said slowly in Sabir, “would that entail?”

Nicolò blinked, and for a moment, his long eyelashes lay outlined in shadow on his cheeks. “You mean you don’t know?” he asked. “How do you not – I thought you were a man of the world,” he said, wide-eyed. “Did I disgust you? I thought…really? You didn’t know?”

“I didn’t know that people do _that!_ ” Yusuf said. Maybe it was true that the Franks were as filthy-minded as everyone said.

Nicolò huffed and drew his knees up to his chest. “Well,” he said, “if that wasn’t what you were asking for, you could have just said so. You don’t need to insult everyone who’s used their –“

“I understand,” Yusuf cut in hastily before Nicolò could repeat himself. Then the last sentence hit him. “ _Everyone_ who’s…you mean this is commonplace? How?”

“Well,” said Nicolò, loosening his position just slightly, “not commonplace, exactly, but I wasn’t expecting you to be surprised. There are plenty of people who confessed to me that they’d done such a thing.” The same shadow that was apt to appear when he spoke of his past life shuttered down over his eyes, but it soon dissipated. “I was a priest, Yusuf. I’ve heard things.”

“ _Heard_ …?” Yusuf sputtered. “What kinds of people have you been speaking with, Nicolò?”

Nicolò cocked his head. “It’s not so much that I’ve been speaking with people, but that they’ve spoken with me. To me, I suppose is the better way to put it. When someone confesses their sins to a priest, it’s a private matter. My job is to absolve them of those sins.”

“So you see it all as sinful,” Yusuf said. Maybe this was a bad idea – maybe Nicolò was having second thoughts. 

“No, no, I’m not saying that.” Nicolò reached out, and for a moment Yusuf thought that he might touch him, but then Nicolò’s arm dropped. “What you want to do with me, Yusuf – wanting to be with me, I don’t think it’s a sin. As for real sin, I’ve heard much, much worse. I think half of Genova told me what went on in their heads at some point.” 

“Like what?” Yusuf couldn’t resist asking. “You didn’t seem surprised at what I asked for.”

Nicolò _hmm_ ed and moved even closer, bumping his shoulder against Yusuf’s. “Oh, what you asked for is nothing,” he said. “I was once told by a man from Padua exactly what he wanted to do with a squash and a set of kitchen skewers. Francesco said – “ He broke off and swore. “I shouldn’t have said his name. At least he’s not someone you know.”

“And,” Yusuf couldn’t resist pointing out, “he might well be dead in that holy war of yours.” _Kitchen skewers?_ He was sure he didn’t want to know.

As he’d expected, Nicolò shot him a dirty look. “You’re doing an exceptional job of bringing up the terrible things I’ve done,” he said, “for someone who seems so eager to get me in bed.”

Yusuf bit his lip. He knew that saying so would be the worst possible thing he could do at this juncture, but Nicolò was outright adorable like this, despite the subject matter. “I don’t want to upset you,” he said instead. “Tell me, Nicolò, if you want me – what _do_ you want?”

Nicolò stroked a hand up and down Yusuf’s arm, making Yusuf shiver. “Tell me what you were asking for first,” he said. “I suspect I’ll like it, whatever it is.”

Yusuf’s face went hot and he ducked his head, avoiding Nicolò’s gaze. “You’ll think it’s foolish now.”

“I won’t,” Nicolò insisted. “Tell me, Yusuf.”

Hearing his name in Nicolò’s voice, in that accent of his, had him undone. “I wanted to fuck your thighs,” Yusuf confessed. “I _want_ to, I mean. I – I want to see if they’re as soft as they look.” Damn his stupid mouth, he’d said it out loud. “I want to lie behind you and put my arm around your waist and…”

“Fuck my thighs,” Nicolò finished. He swallowed audibly. When Yusuf looked back at him, he saw that color had risen in Nicolò’s cheeks and that his breath had begun to come in quick bursts. “Do you have anything to, um, make it easier? Smoother, I mean. Oil?”

“Yes,” said Yusuf. “In my pack.” He’d bought the vial at the last town they’d stopped in, thinking to use it during the nights he spent with his hand on himself, but now it seemed the oil would be used for a better purpose. “Should I get it?”

Nicolò shook his head. “First this,” he said, and pulled Yusuf towards him with a hand fisted in his hair, then kissed him again.

Yusuf eagerly kissed back, soon getting into the rhythm. As before, Nicolò’s kissing was a bit too sloppy, his inexperience plain in the way he moved his lips. But he was a fast learner, and Yusuf soon had one hand on the back of Nicolò’s neck and the other on the small of his back, their bodies as close as they could be with the barrier of clothes between them. “Will you undress for me, Nicolò?” Yusuf asked when he pulled away to breathe, resting their foreheads together so that he could feel the heat of Nicolò’s flushed face. “Are you comfortable with that?” He wanted to feel skin on skin, but the thought of himself pulling up his robe and Nicolò pulling down his trousers made his cock twitch, too.

“Yes,” said Nicolò, and scrambled back entirely, pulling his shirt and tunic over his head so quickly that he briefly got stuck. “Oh, God’s _wounds_ …would you stop laughing, Yusuf?” He flailed for a moment and finally emerged, expression grouchy and hair mussed.

Yusuf held his fist in front of his mouth and stifled the rest of the oncoming giggles. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean…oh, _Nicolò_.” He had seen Nicolò nude before – bathing together, and traveling together in general, made it an unavoidable phenomenon. But his beauty was even more apparent in firelight than sunlight, with the shadows emphasizing broad planes and endearingly soft parts alike. “I want to hold you.”

Nicolò shook his head as he crossed his arms over his chest. “Not before you take your clothes off,” he said. “It has to be fair.”

Yusuf nodded and disrobed as fast as he could. When he finished, he found that not only had Nicolò taken off the rest of his clothes, but he’d stood up, too. The view was excellent, beginning with the thighs that awakened a ridiculous urge in Yusuf to bite them and going upwards from there. Nicolò had no experience; Yusuf knew that. Still, by instinct or through what he’d heard in those ridiculous confessions, he knew how to display himself.

“We should…lie down,” said Yusuf through his suddenly dry throat. “The bedrolls,” and he got to his feet, letting his clothing drop to the ground. He was gratified to see Nicolò’s mouth fall open as his chest and belly went pink. “The oil, too. I’ll get it.” 

Nicolò nodded jerkily and bolted for their things. Yusuf followed just slowly enough to watch the slight softness of his thighs move as he ran, then found his own pack and took out the oil. He could hear Nicolò shaking out and setting up his bedroll with admirable efficiency; his stomach tightened and his heart began to race in anticipation of exactly _why_ Nicolò might want to be so quick.

“Here,” said Yusuf, and took out his own bedroll to set up overlapping Nicolò’s. His hands, he noticed, were shaking. “Do you want to lie down? I mean, of course you do…just…” He thought that the last time he was this awkward in bed might have been when he was a boy of eighteen or twenty. If Nicolò changed his mind after hearing him babble, Yusuf wouldn’t blame him. “I’d like to hold you, too, while I rub against you.” There, at least that was comprehensible.

“Yes,” Nicolò said at once. “I want that very much.” He lay down on his bedroll, a feast for Yusuf’s eyes, and curled up partway. Then he shot Yusuf a look, heated yet clearly unsure, over the rise of his shoulder. “Well?”

Yusuf squeezed the little bottle in his hand and tried not to bite through his lower lip. No matter how quickly he healed, he didn’t want to disgust Nicolò. Not now. “Well,” he echoed, and followed him.

It was such a small thing to lie down and move close enough that the front of his body met the back of Nicolò’s, but it was a barrier he hadn’t dared to breach in their years of traveling together. It didn’t matter how cold the night might be; he’d shivered in the cold rather than risk invading Nicolò’s personal space. Now his shivering came from Nicolò’s proximity - his heat, the backward swell of his shoulders as he breathed, the smell of him. Yusuf found that his right arm fit over Nicolò’s waist as if it was made to be there. “Nicolò?” His breath stirred the hairs behind Nicolò’s ear. “Is this all right?”

“ _Touch me_ ,” came the reply in a tone Yusuf had never heard from Nicolò. He had heard Nicolò’s voice nearly this rough, filled with more emotion than this, but never this undone. “Please, Yusuf, please. I want it. I want _you_.”

“Yes,” said Yusuf, unable to say anything else. He wanted Nicolò so much that the desire filled his throat and threatened to choke him. He didn’t want to die that way, if it was even possible. Not yet. Not before he and Nicolò had taken their pleasure from each other.

He was rock-hard against Nicolò’s backside, and he nudged his hips forward, pulling a moan out of Nicolò. “Yusuf, that’s…you’re _wonderful_ ,” Nicolò said. “I need you. Please!”

 _You’re wonderful._ If someone had said, twenty-seven years ago, that one day Nicolò would be gasping that out while Yusuf held him close enough to feel his heartbeat against his own chest, he would have laughed in their face. Now, he nodded and fumbled with the bottle of oil one-handedly, not wanting to pull away from Nicolò even long enough to use both hands. “I’ve got… _there!_ ” The stopper popped out and he eagerly covered his fingers with oil. “I’m going to touch you now.”

“Move any slower and I’ll kill you,” Nicolò said, not sounding at all like he meant it. He squirmed forward and put just enough space between them that Yusuf could feel the night air on his skin. Compared to Nicolò’s body, it was freezing cold. “Come on, do it!”

Yusuf bit back a quip about how being this eager had gotten Nicolò in trouble before, and instead reached between them to coat the backs of Nicolò’s thighs and ass with oil. Nicolò shivered, and chill bumps rose against Yusuf’s hand, which didn’t help his state of arousal. “That’s it,” he said, urging Nicolò’s thighs apart with a gentle push. “I have to put this in between, here.”

Nicolò eagerly complied. When Yusuf reached between his legs and dared a fondle with his freshly-oiled hand, he outright shouted, loosing words in his Genovan language that Yusuf recognized as the foulest swear words possible. He hid a smile; so much for the asceticism of priests. “You’re killing me on purpose,” Nicolò whimpered. “I’ll come, Yusuf, I swear I will. If you keep that up, I’ll come before you can even put it there.”

Yusuf groaned and drew air in through his teeth, then let it out in a slow breath. “You’ll make me do the same thing, with that kind of talk,” he got out.

“Good.”

That earned Nicolò a squeeze to the left cheek. Yusuf was gratified at the sound he made. “You’re so impatient,” he said. “Will you just let me…” He smoothed some oil down the insides of Nicolò’s thighs, which were smoother than they had a right to be, and shuffled awkwardly down from his knees until he had reached his former position. “All right.” He stroked his own cock, only narrowly resisting more, and slid forward until he met the space between Nicolò’s legs.

Which promptly snapped shut.

Yusuf yelped and pulled backwards. “Ow! What did you do that for?”

“I didn’t do it on purpose!” came the reply. “You were slippery – it just happened!”

“Just _happened?_ ” Yusuf rubbed at his erection, which was a little less hard than it had been, all things considered. “You’re sure you weren’t trying to chop it off?”

Nicolò boosted himself up and craned his neck to glare at Yusuf. “I’ve never done this before, all right? You know that. I don’t know what it’s supposed to feel like, and you surprised me.” His face flushed. “Doing this with you is – is different from hearing about it in other people’s confessions.”

Yusuf couldn’t hold back his laugh, despite the daggers in Nicolò’s eyes. “You couldn’t figure that out before you tried to crush my cock?”

Nicolò let his head thunk down onto his arm. “I hate you.”

He’d heard those words a hundred times from Nicolò, a thousand, but Yusuf knew he didn’t mean them now. “You don’t,” he said, running his hand along the dip of Nicolò’s side. “I know it and you know it.”

“Yes,” said Nicolò. “I do, damn you.” He pressed his ass against Yusuf’s cock again, and Yusuf found himself making a completely unintentional noise as he filled to full hardness again. “I’ll be careful, but please, won’t you come back?”

Yusuf shakily let out his breath and buried his face in the place where Nicolò’s neck met his shoulder, mouthing at the skin. “Let’s try again,” he said. This time as he eased himself in between Nicolò’s legs, he kept a hand on one of Nicolò’s thighs to steady him – and this time, it worked. Those beautiful legs closed just enough to keep him in place, but not enough that he couldn’t start a slow rhythm of thrusts that threatened to undo him.

“Oh, God,” said Nicolò, and reached backwards, his fingers helplessly spasming. Yusuf took his hand tightly in his own and laced their fingers together. “You feel so…” He swallowed against another audible whine. “You feel so good. I don’t know – _Jesus in heaven_ – don’t know how to say _how_ good.”

Yusuf couldn’t decide if he was more flattered or aroused by all the blasphemy. He decided to split the difference and keep moving. Already, he could smell his own scent rising and mixing with Nicolò’s, and his head spun from it. “Will you come from this?” he panted, moving his hips faster. “Can you?”

Nicolò took his hand and pulled it around to his front instead of replying. Yusuf’s breath came in a shudder as his palm met Nicolò’s own straining erection. It felt, as did the others he’d touched in his life, much like his own. From this angle, he could almost imagine that he was touching himself, thinking of Nicolò, as Nicolò had undoubtedly done while thinking of him. “Oh…” He moved his wrist in a slow sort of flick, and Nicolò made a noise like he’d been stabbed.

“I want,” Nicolò said between harsh, puffing breaths, “I have to… _Yusuf_.”

So did he, but Yusuf was too far gone to say it. He moaned instead and bit at Nicolò’s shoulder, unable to help it. “I…” Everything narrowed to sensation, Nicolò’s thighs oiled and squirming around his cock, Nicolò’s erection firm and leaking in his hand. He wasn’t sure how it was possible to be so close to a man, so fulfilled by him, and still want him so very badly. It was fire, but not; not ice, though he shivered. He had read so many poems that he’d lost count, and he had never found any that described what he felt now.

He barely knew he was going to come before it was happening. His hips stuttered and he cried out, then spilled against Nicolò’s ass and thighs as his body shuddered in a contraction so deep it felt almost violent. “Nicolò,” he whispered. “God… _Nicolò_.” He clung tighter and let the feeling run through him in a softer aftershock.

Nicolò moaned his name and put his hand over Yusuf’s, squeezing it around his cock. “I need…”

Yusuf lavished Nicolò’s neck with kisses and tightened his hold. It was his companion’s turn now; he’d already had his own release, and now he knew Nicolò needed seeing to, a task he was more than glad to complete. “Lie still,” he said, and kissed Nicolò’s ear. “Let me take care of you.” Nicolò’s breath shuddered in, and Yusuf wasn’t sure if that was because Yusuf’s thumb had just slid under the head of his cock or because he liked what he heard.

He worked Nicolò’s erection with his hand until he could tell by the way Nicolò trembled in his embrace that his climax was moments away. “Come for me,” he said in his mother tongue, sliding his forefinger around the head to tease it. “Let go, Nicolò.”

Nicolò didn’t shout when he came. Instead he let out a low moan and curled forward, spilling over Yusuf’s hand. “ _Oh_ ,” he said in a tone so deep and satisfied that Yusuf felt his spent cock twitch. “You’re…”

Yusuf moved his hand from Nicolò’s cock to his belly and pressed it there, holding him close. “What am I?”

Nicolò turned in his grasp and kissed him. Yusuf’s head spun when he was finished; it seemed Nicolò was a quick learner. While his lips still pressed a bit too intensely against Yusuf’s, the sloppiness was quickly disappearing. “You’re _something_ ,” Nicolò said. “I don’t know what the right word is. I just – I liked that, what we just did. I like _you_.”

Yusuf’s heart thumped hard in his chest, and he cleared his throat after a long moment. “Well,” he said, “how do my fantasies compare to Francesco from Pisa?”

“ _Padua_ ,” Nicolò corrected, bestowing another kiss on him. “I think I like yours much better, Yusuf from Mahdia.” He pronounced the name of Yusuf’s home city more carefully than Yusuf had ever heard him say it, and his belly fluttered to hear it. “Tell me more of them.”

“Some other time.” Yusuf kissed Nicolò’s forehead, then both cheeks. He knew they would need to sit up before the night was out, and wipe themselves off before the encroaching stickiness made it impossible, but if there was anything the two of them were not short of, it was time. “And if you have any to tell me, I’d like to hear them, too.”

He thought he felt Nicolò smile as he pressed his face into Yusuf’s neck for one more kiss. “You have no idea.”

“No?”

“No.” Nicolò pulled back and grinned at him. “What about both of us in each other’s mouths at the same time? Once I’ve mastered putting yours in my mouth, that is.”

Yusuf could swear he felt his entire body tighten, never mind his cock. Nicolò was going to permanently kill him with that kind of talk, and he didn’t think he particularly minded. “I’ve never heard of that before,” he said, “but I think it sounds like a very, _very_ good idea.” Maybe Franks’ ideas weren’t so terrible after all.

Nicolò, Yusuf thought, couldn’t have looked more satisfied. “Good. Another night, then.”

“I can’t wait,” said Yusuf, and suddenly the days of traveling and leagues of sand they undoubtedly had yet to tromp over on their journey to the next city didn’t seem so terrible. Not when he and Nicolò had so many things to teach each other when the sun went down. “Another night.”

**Author's Note:**

> Sabir was the original _lingua franca_ , lit. "language of the Franks," used as a trading language all over the Mediterranean at the time Joe and Nicky first met. 
> 
> Yes, I did make their very first spooning into an 18+ spooning. I couldn't resist. :D 
> 
> I can be found on Tumblr as godihatethisfreakingcat.


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